Ae ajnabee tu bhee kabhee aawaaz de kaheen se
Posted on: December 4, 2025
This article is written by Nahm, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a contributor to this blog. This article is meant to be posted in atulsongaday.me. If this article appears in other sites without the knowledge and consent of the web administrator of atulsongaday.me, then it is piracy of the copyright content of atulsongaday.me and is a punishable offence under the existing laws.
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Blog Day : |
6348 | Post No. : | 19674 |
A R Rahman – The Musician of 21st Century – 8
The film “Dil Se” released in 1998, and by this time A. R. Rehman, has revolutionized the Hindi film music. With the south Indian flavour to his compositions, with various talented singers from the region were flooding the hindi film music world. Mostly his films would be originally made in Tamil, Telegu or Malayalam, and later remade in hindi or sometimes just dubbed in hindi.
His music and rerecording the songs in hindi required, rewriting the lyrics in hindi/urdu to mean and sound the same in hindi films. It was a difficult task for lyricists like Mehboob and later on Gulzar to retain the meaning and spirit of the earlier songs, while converting them for the larger hindi film audience.
Sometimes, these songs turned out to be awkward, talking about things no hindi film song had yet talked of. A song like “Rukmani” no hindi film lyricist of yore would have wanted to touch. But Mehboob did, so did A. R. Rehman, for what was an accepted form of expression in one language could be not palatable or easily expressible in other languages. For those who are not familiar with Tamil and expressions there, cannot get the spirit of it in the hindi language. Mehboob went into translating the words and not the expressions. I am not sure if he ever got the hang of it. For something like this, one must be expert of prose and poetic expressions in both the languages. Only then such translations would come out expressing spirit and not just the words. I have tried some translations, and can vouch that it is very easy to fall into the rut of translating the words and not the meaning/spirit behind those words.
But this lyrical limitation was no hindrance to ARR’s music. It transcended the boundaries and scaled heights and continues to do so. I consider both “Dil Se” and “Yuvraaj” to be among ARR’s best work. In both these films he had Gulzar to work with. Whoever’s brain wave it was to team up Gulzar with ARR, needs to be complimented for making the hindi film music richer. Gulzar’s talent at adaptability is second to none, he has proved it with this association alone. He gelled very well with RDB, who was a product of another rich cultural and literary heritage. Then Raakhi being of the same background may have helped. But to reinvent himself to create with the likes of ARR, decades later is genuinely marvellous.
I have my own favourite songs across many music scores by ARR. The 3 top posted in the blog are here:
2. Chanda re chanda re kabhi to zameen par aa
I don’t know many of his newer songs, and many older movies songs. I am selecting only from the popular and known songs. In “Dil Se” aye ajnabi has always been my favourite along-with the title song, not the song of the decade Chal chhainyya chhainyya chhainyya chhainyya (Dil Se), with which I started this series.
I have always wanted to write this post of Udit Narayan song with refrain of “paakhi paakhi pardersi” by Mahalaxmi Iyer. Note the desolate expressions here, they are indescribable in a truly absorbable manner. The word “Ajnabi” here is not to say “Stranger”, but ‘estranged”. “paakhi paakhi pardesi” term refers to the migratory birds and people who migrated, never to return. Have become estranged, in other words. The poet here yearns to connect with the estranged.
अदावतें थी, तगाफुल था, रंज़िशें थी मगर
बिछड़ने वाले में सबकुछ था, बेवफ़ाई ना थी
Talking of “tukdon mein jeena” is like “divided we fall”.
Very old school, to think in regretting terms of past, but that is what Gulzar is. Very intense and sometimes trivial. Or an expert in expressing deep emotions in mundane things. Saying things like “Dhoodh dhuli” and “Maasoom kali” is to tell the purity and innocence of the estranged.
Song number 08 of the series is done and dusted.
Audio:
Video:
Song-Ae ajnabee tu bhee kabhee aawaaz de kaheen se (Dil Se)(1998) Singers-Mahalaxmi Iyer, Udit Narayan, Lyricist-Gulzar, MD-A R Rahman
Lyrics:
O o o o o o
Paakhee paakhee pardesee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
main yehaan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
main yehan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
tu kaheen een
tukdon mein
jee rahee hai ae ae ae
aye ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
roz roz resham see hawaa
aate jaate kehtee hai bataa
resham see hawaa
kehtee hai bataa
wo jo doodh dhulee
maasoom kalee
woh hai kahaan
kahaan hai
woh raushnee kahaan hai
woh jaan see kahaan hai
main adhoora
tu adhooree
jee ee rahee hai ae ae
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
ae ajnabee
tu bhi kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
main yehaan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
main yehaan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
tu kahin een
tukdon mein
ji rahee hai ae ae ae
ae Ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kahin se
Paakhee paakhee pardesee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee ee
paakhee paakhee pardesee ee ee
tu to naheen hai lekin
teri muskurahat hai ea
chehra kaheen naheen hai
par teree aahaten hain
tu hai kahaan
kahaan hai
tera nishaan kahaan hai
mera jahaan kahaan hai
main adhoora
tu adhooree
jee rahee hai ae ae
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
main yehaan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
main yehaan tukdon mein jee rahaa hoon
tu kaheen een tukdon mein
ji rahee hai ae ae ae
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kahin se
ae ajnabee
tu bhee kabhee
aawaaz de Kaheen se
Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
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